Give me the support of God, and I can easily bear the insults
of men. Let me lay my head on the chest of Jesus, and I will
not fear the interruptions of care and trouble. If my God will
forever give me the light of His smile, and a glimpse of His
blessing–it is enough. Come on enemies, persecutors,
demons, yes, the Devil himself, for “the Lord God is my sun
and shield.” Gather, you clouds, and surround me, I carry a
Sun within me; blow, wind of the frozen north, I have a fire of
living coal within me; yes, death, kill me, but I have another
life–a life in the light of God’s countenance.
-Spurgeon

Four great concerns….

by Don Fortner

“Enoch WALKED with God….” Genesis 5:24

My heart is motivated, driven and governed by four great concerns.
Here are four things I want more than anything in this world.
I am not an ambitious man. But I am ambitious for these
four things. For the attainment of these four things I am
prepared, by the grace of God, to sacrifice everything else.
I count all other things to be but rubbish by comparison.

1. I want to know Christ (Phil. 3:10).
Yes, I believe that in measure I do know him. God has revealed
his grace and glory to me in the Person of his dear Son.
Still, I want a growing, spiritual, experimental knowledge of the
Lord Jesus Christ. I want to know all that he has done for me.
I want to know him. I want to know him fully.

2. I want to be totally committed to Christ.
I want to totally lose my life to Christ and in Christ, so that I
can truthfully say with the Apostle Paul, “For me to live is Christ.”
I want to be committed to Christ as he was to the Father, so that
my heart says to him in all things, “Not my will, thy will be done”
It is my continual prayer that God will give me a heart–
committed to the Lord Jesus Christ,
committed to his will,
committed to his gospel,
committed to his people,
committed to the cause of his glory in this world.

3. I want to be like Christ.
My heart longs to be like him, conformed to him, made into
his likeness. I want to be like him love, tenderness, and
thoughtfulness, in zeal, dedication, and devotion, purity,
holiness, and righteousness.

4. I want to live in communion with Christ.
Like Enoch of old, I want to walk with God.

I know these goals are not attainable in this life. Yet, they are
the things for which my soul hungers and my heart thirsts. I cannot
be satisfied with less. “I count not myself to have apprehended:
but this one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind,
and reaching forth unto those things which are before, I press
toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ
Jesus” (Phil. 3:13-14). “I shall be satisfied when I awake with
Christ’s likeness” (Psa. 17:15), but not until then.

“Enoch WALKED with God….” Genesis 5:24

The religionists of the day

(J. C. Philpot, “Faith’s Standing-Ground” 1862)

“And everyone will hate you because of your
allegiance to Me.” Luke 21:17

Professors of religion have always been the
deadliest enemies of the children of God.

Who were so opposed to the blessed Lord as the
Scribes and Pharisees? It was the religious teachers
and leaders who crucified the Lord of glory!

And so in every age the religionists of the day
have been the hottest and bitterest persecutors
of the Church of Christ.

Nor is the case altered now. The more the children
of God are firm in the truth, the more they enjoy its
power, the more they live under its influence, and
the more tenderly and conscientiously they walk in
godly fear, the more will the professing generation
of the day hate them with a deadly hatred.

Let us not think that we can disarm it by a godly life;
for the more that we walk in the sweet enjoyment of
heavenly truth and let our light shine before men as
having been with Jesus, the more will this draw down
their hatred and contempt.

“And the world hates them because they do not
belong to the world, just as I do not.” John 17:14

Weak and singular and odd!

(John Newton)

A consistent Christian, whose integrity, humility, and philanthropy,
mark his character and adorn his profession — will in time command respect.

But his attachment to the unfashionable truths of the Gospel, and his
separation from the maxims and pursuits of the world — will render him
weak and singular and odd in their eyes.

“If the world hates you, keep in mind that it hated Me first. If you
belonged to the world, it would love you as its own. As it is, you do
not belong to the world, but I have chosen you out of the world. That is
why the world hates you!” John 15:18-19

The highest honor?

Spurgeon, “INDEPENDENCE OF CHRISTIANITY”

To be pampered, flattered, and applauded by men,
is a poor, base thing, that is not worth having.

To be despised, to be spit upon, to be caricatured, and to
be jeered, is the highest honor that a Christian can have.

His children began to hiss!

(Excerpts from the letters of William Tiptaft)

Dear brother,
Since I last wrote, I have preached in Abingdon Great
Church, on Christmas evening. I preached the truth, I
trust, to a very crowded congregation, supposed to be
(sitting and standing, who were able to get in) about
5,000 people. I pleased the believers; but very much
displeased the carnally-minded, who were never before
so puzzled and confounded in all their lives! I spoke the
truth faithfully, and so as all could hear; but I had no
idea that the gospel would have given so much offence!
It is the truth that offends and disturbs Satan’s
kingdom! The neighboring clergymen, who are in
darkness, say of me, “Away with such a fellow from
the earth; it is not fit that he should live!”

My mind is not moved by the persecution. I believe
if God has a work for me to do, I shall do it, in spite
of the devil and all his children!

Nature is not changed, the gospel is not changed,
and Christ is not changed. What reason is there why
they should not hate the truth now, as much as in the
time of the apostles? I never saw any fruits of my
labors until I roused and disturbed the ‘roaring lion’.
When, through the grace of God, I began to disturb
his kingdom, I soon found that his children began
to hiss!

The world and Satan hate believers. The Pharisees
hate me the most. I cut off all their rotten props,
and all their fleshly devotion!

It is not coming near to the truth, it is not the ‘mere letter’
of the gospel, that will convert men; but the Holy Spirit.

Make the Word of God your study. Pin your faith to
no man’s views! I scarcely read any other book.

Beware of those who want to exalt man in any manner.

Yours very affectionately,
William Tiptaft, Jan. 30th, 1830

Even your own relatives think you are almost insane

(J. C. Philpot, “The Abiding Comforter” 1858)

“The Spirit of truth. The world cannot receive Him,
because it neither sees Him nor knows Him.”
John 14:17

The world—that is, the world dead in sin, and the
world dead in profession—men destitute of the life
and power of God—must have something that it can
see. And, as heavenly things can only be seen by
heavenly eyes, they cannot receive the things which
are invisible.

Now this explains why a religion that presents itself
with a degree of beauty and grandeur to the natural
eye will always be received by the world; while a . . .
spiritual,
internal,
heartfelt and
experimental
religion will always be rejected.

The world can receive a religion that consists of . . .
forms,
rites, and
ceremonies.

These are things seen.

Beautiful buildings,
painted windows,
pealing organs,
melodious choirs,
the pomp and parade of an earthly priesthood,
and a whole apparatus of ‘religious ceremony’,
carry with them something that the natural eye can
see and admire. The world receives all this ‘external
religion’ because it is suitable to the natural mind
and intelligible to their reasoning faculties.

But the . . .
quiet,
inward,
experimental,
divine religion,
which presents no attractions to the outward eye, but
is wrought in the heart by a divine operation—the world
cannot receive this—because it presents nothing that
the natural eye can rest upon with pleasure, or is
adapted to gratify their general idea of what religion
is or should be.

Do not marvel, then, that worldly professors despise a
religion wrought in the soul by the power of God. Do not
be surprised if even your own relatives think you are
almost insane, when you speak of the consolations of
the Spirit, or of the teachings of God in your soul. They
cannot receive these things, for they have no experience
of them; and being such as are altogether opposed to
the carnal mind, they reject them with enmity and scorn.

Of Suffering
It is not every suffering that makes a martyr, but suffering for the
word of God after a right manner; that is, not only for righteousness,
but for righteousness’ sake; not only for truth, but out of love to
truth; not only for God’s word, but according to it; that is, in that
holy, humble, meek manner, as the word of God requires.
It is a rare thing to suffer aright, and to have my spirit in suffering
turned only against God’s enemy, sin; sin in doctrine, sin in worship,
sin in life, and sin in conversation. …
I have often thought that the best of Christians are found in the worst
of times. And I have thought again that one reason why we are no better,
is because God purges us no more. Noah and Lot—who so holy as they in
the time of their afflictions? And yet who so idle as they in the time
of their prosperity? –John Bunyan

This is true obedience, whether to God or man, when we look not so much
to the letter of the law, as to the mind of the law-maker. –John Trapp

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It often happens, in the Psalms, that you can scarcely tell whether it
is David, or the Lord Jesus, or both of them, to whom the writer is
referring. Oftentimes you lose sight of David altogether, and are quiet
certain that he is not there; while, at other times, the words seem equally
suited either to David as the type, or to Jesus as the antitype. I think
that this fact is very instructive to us. It is as the Holy Ghost intended,
even in those ancient times, to let God’s saints know that there is a
mysterious union between Christ and His people, so that almost all things
which may be said concerning Him may be said, also, concerning those who are
in Him. They are so completely one, they are so intimately united in bonds
of mystic, vital, conjugal, eternal union, that it would not be possible
always to keep the sayings concerning them apart. — Charles Spurgeon

Jesus sustains no association to His Church more expressive than that of the marriage relationship. From all eternity He forever betrothed her to Himself. He asked her at the hands of her Father—and the Father gave her to Him. He entered into a covenant that she would be His. The conditions of that covenant were great, but not too great for His love to undertake. They were, that He should assume her nature, discharge her legal obligations, endure her punishment, repair her ruin, and bring her to glory! He undertook all, and He accomplished all, because He loved her! The love of Jesus to His Church is the love of the most tender husband. It is single, constant, affectionate, matchless, wonderful. Jesus sympathizes with her, nourishes her, provides for her, clothes her, watches over, and indulges her with the most intimate and endearing tenderness.